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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/26683315">ticket to anywhere</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/punk_femme/pseuds/punk_femme'>punk_femme</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>where you start, where you end [2]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Naruto</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Alternate Universe - No Zetsu/Project Tsuki no Me, Alternative Universe - Canon Divergence, Gen, Jinchuuriki Nohara Rin, Mental Health Issues, Nohara Rin Lives, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Tags Will Update with New Chapters, Travel, written from experience and not a huge part of it. but its there</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>In-Progress</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-09-27</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-12-17</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-18 10:28:45</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>General Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>3</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>6,155</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/26683315</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/punk_femme/pseuds/punk_femme</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>The world was so big. And Rin was very, very small.</p><p>Start slow.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Nohara Rin &amp; Sanbi | Three-tails | Isobu</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>where you start, where you end [2]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/series/1870666</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>6</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>39</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>1. anyplace is better</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>Second part of this AU! Rin's travels between the Kyuubi attack and Team 7's Chuunin Exams.</p>
    </blockquote><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>The beginning of a journey.<br/>(fic and chapter titles from Fast Car by Tracy Chapman)</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Rin leaves in autumn. The fourteenth of October, to be more specific, four days after the Kyuubi attack. The forest is lit up in red and gold, the air is crisp. She loves autumn, but it’s hard to enjoy the weather for all the grief that chokes her.</p><p>The maple leaves are the same color as Kushina’s hair. The gingko match Minato’s. She wonders what color little Naruto’s was.</p><p>She keeps walking.</p><p>See, the thing is, Rin left Konoha because staying there hurt. She couldn’t breath there anymore, didn’t have anything left to hold onto, couldn’t find a reason why she should stay when if she left she wouldn’t have to kill, she wouldn’t be relied on, she could look for Obito.</p><p>But now that she was out here, she didn’t know where to start. The world was so big. And Rin was very, very small.</p><p><i>Start slow</i>, Isobu reminded her. <i>You have two years just to explore this country alone</i>.</p><p>She adjusted her pack straps, puffed up her cheeks, and exhaled slowly. Take things slow. One step at a time. She could do that. Probably. She’d never really learned.</p><p>It helped to have Isobu there. Kushina and Minato were gone. Obito was gone, again. Kakashi and Anko wouldn’t speak to her. But at least she had Isobu, and he couldn’t leave her even if he tried. She swore then and there she would be the best container for him that she could be.</p><p>Apparently, Rin couldn’t read maps. She stared down at the map, detailing only Fire Country, until her vision blurred and she had to shake her head to clear it.</p><p>Isobu chuckled at her for a good long moment. Her cheeks warmed.</p><p>
  <i>Did you know that my children are all skilled navigators?</i>
</p><p>“Your children?”</p><p>Silence. Right. He’d been trying to get her into the habit of responding to him without speaking out loud.</p><p><i> "Your children?”</i> She asked again.</p><p>
  <i>Turtles. All turtles and tortoises bloodlines trace back to me, centuries upon centuries back. They’re more like my grandchildren, and great-great-great-great grandchildren, but…</i>
</p><p>Rin nodded.</p><p>
  <i>“‘Children’ is simpler.”</i>
</p><p>
  <i>Yes. Anyways, I can help you get from place to place until you figure out how to read a map.<i></i></i>
</p><p>
  <i>
    <i></i>
  </i>
</p><p>
  <i>
    <i></i>
  </i>
</p><p>She clapped her hands together in excitement. <i>“You’d do that? Really?”</i></p><p><i>I have a price.</i> She deflated a little, but listened. <i>I want to taste seaweed.</i></p><p>Rin frowned. One of her least favorite foods. But if it would keep her from getting lost in the woods for weeks on end…</p><p>
  <i>“Fine. Please help me.”</i>
</p><p>Isobu laughed, and together they made travel plans.</p>
<hr/><p>They head to Tanzaku Gai first. A tourist hotspot, it’s starting to empty now that the weathers turning chilly, which makes it the perfect time, in Rin’s opinion, to stay a while.</p><p>She starts to take on odd jobs. She has no plan of settling in here, but even less does she want to idle. Rin’s used to work, and she’d turned restless within days of getting her room, so work she does.</p><p>It’s mostly delivery runs at first, then within the week she’s approached for bodyguard delivery to the next town over. She packs up her few belongings, and agrees.</p><p>She spends two days walking alongside a cart driven by cattle, easing the mind of a family afraid to travel the roads alone. Though nothing threatens them, she doesn’t blame them for the precaution. Not with the unease that’s followed the end of the Third Shinobi War. The Land of Fire was struggling, as much as they tried to hide it, and relations between the shinobi nations were strained.</p><p>The job is simple, almost boring, really.</p><p>The shops at their destination give her a warm welcome, and she has money enough to leave with a small bag of candy that she stows away in her pack. It’s not a bad place, very agricultural, and she spends some time there just admiring the effort that goes into something as easily taken for granted as wheat.</p><p>Then, after a couple of days, she heads south.</p><p>The next village on the map takes her down, closer to the coast. She didn’t realize just how close until she hears the cries of gulls and smells salt in the air.</p><p>Isobu is alert at the first hint of the ocean.</p><p>It takes her about a day to reach a small village in the Land of Waves. Isobu responds like an excited child at the feeling of water surrounding them on the boat ride in, and she can’t help but smile.</p><p>The village itself is small. Definitely a fishing town judging by the stalls in the market area, which she supposes makes sense.</p><p>Rin takes the time to have lunch, and then goes to the beach. There’s a shop being repaired not far from the stretch of the sand, so it’s not as quiet as she’d prefer, but it’s better here than getting in the way of the fishermen. She lets Isobu have her eyes, turn her hands rough and clawed so he can see and feel the water properly. They share senses but he insists it’s not the same through her skin.</p><p>She doesn’t know how long they spend there. It doesn’t matter, really. They have no schedule to adhere to, no places to be.</p><p>When Isobu gives her back full control of her body, the carpenters are taking a break. A girl not much older than Rin seems to be dropping off a lunch for one of them, and Rin lets herself appreciate her long, blue-black hair.</p><p>Rin had always put practicality over fashion, but she’d always liked fashionable girls.</p><p>She wondered how Anko was doing, then shoved the thought aside to ask Isobu if she should take any shells as souvenirs.</p>
<hr/><p>The first snowfall greets her near the Land of Whirlpools.</p><p>Rin and Isobu had continued along the water, tracing what would appear as a large “U” on the map as she followed the coastline and ended up here. Another fishing town, larger than the one she’d visited in the Land of Waves.</p><p>In the distance, she could see the ruins of Uzushiogakure.</p>
<hr/><p>A cold February day, she sees Kakashi again. She’s been summoned to an outpost for a mission, and is greeted by a small squad.</p><p>Among them: Kakashi. Among them: the smallest Uchiha Rin has ever seen. The team leader was a young man she did recognize: Raido Namiashi, formerly of Minato’s personal guard. Her heart ached to see them, her old friend, such a young Uchiha, and a reminder of what she’s lost.</p><p>She just smiles, and says she’s ready to go.</p><p>The mission was rough, but not the worst she’s ever faced.</p><p>Information retrieval first and foremost, with minimal fighting. The tiny Uchiha -- Shisui, she remembers, he’d introduced himself -- is clearly skilled despite his age, though it shouldn’t have surprised her after knowing Kakashi all this time.</p><p>The ability to heal with Isobu’s chakra in her system had never come back to her, not really. She’d tried, back in Konoha, to get it back, she really had. But out here, she’d neglected to keep at it, and she curses it when a mercenary breaks Kakashi’s wrist.</p><p>So Rin splints the injury, and takes his place in the fighting.</p><p>She keeps Isobu reigned in, relying on only her own strength save for when one opponent catches her off-guard, with no room for her to dodge, and she instinctively covers their face in stinging coral.</p><p>When she catches Raido watching her thoughtfully between his own opponents, she wonders if she made the right choice. She’s afraid of being seen as a fully realized jinchuuriki, knows it could have her called back to the Village, and she doesn’t want to go back yet.</p><p>She wants to see the world, and find Obito.</p>
<hr/><p>Back at the outpost after the mission, she goes back to Kakashi’s wrist. She replaces the field splint with something more comfortable, and rewraps it.</p><p>It’s not like she wasn’t healing because she didn’t want to. She’d tried, but even though she’d regained and even surpassed so much of her previous power, she just couldn’t get healing to work.</p><p>He didn’t meet her eyes, the whole time. His gaze locked somewhere beside her shoulder as even as the rest of the team left the room to report.</p><p>When they were alone, he spoke.</p><p>“Don’t come back to Konoha. Shimuras up to something, and he’d make sure you stayed under his direct command if he got his hands on you. It’s good that you’re out here.”</p><p>His words startle her.</p><p>“What is Shimura doing?” She tries, but he only shakes his head.</p><p>“how do you know this?” She tries. He shakes his head again in lieu of an answer.</p><p>“I can’t say that. I don’t know it all. Just trust me to take care of things at home, and you stay out of the Village. Please.”</p><p>He actually looked up at her as he spoke. That compelled her to listen, that and how Rin wasn’t sure she’d ever heard him say “please” to her.</p><p>“Okay. I trust you.” She promises, and hopes that she’s not letting him get into danger alone. “When I find Obito, we’ll fix things, so stay safe, okay?”</p><p>His gaze drops back down.</p><p>“Yeah. Okay.”</p>
<hr/><p>Spring had begun. Plants had started to peer through the snow, daffodils and tulips preparing to bloom despite the lingering cold. Soon, the squirrels and rabbits would come back out.</p><p>She kept traveling, until she was sure she’d visited every town and village on the map, and then some. It was nice to just travel like this.</p><p>Still, Kakashi’s warning follows her. Through all of spring, she worries about him, worries that she’ll be pulled home before she can fulfill her promise to him to bring Obito home, or her promise to Isobu to show them both the world.</p><p>Into the summer, she starts to relax. Nothing has happened, no hint of Root, no Konoha shinobi in her life at all save for the reports she’s contracted to write home.</p><p>In September, Rin is attacked.</p><p>The sound of a body moving through leaves, and then a blade flying towards her. She ducks.</p><p>It’s a whirlwind of movement in which she struggles to see anything clearly but she catches the gleam of a porcelain mask, silver armored vests under their brown cloak. She kicks off of a branch to drop to the forest floor, avoiding an explosive kunai.</p><p>Why would Konoha send ANBU after her? She had the Hokage’s signature to prove that she was allowed to be out of the Village like this!</p><p>Then one turned to face her, and she saw the mask's face was blank.</p><p>Konoha didn’t send ANBU after her.</p><p>Shimura had.</p><p>And they’ve attacked her. Kakashi must have been right. She defends herself, of course. Doesn’t aim to kill, only knocks them out, and notices they’re doing the same to her.</p><p>“What do you want?!”</p><p>There’s no reply but a wind jutsu she doesn’t quite manage to avoid. It slices open her cheek as she tries to dodge, but even as it starts to bleed she can feel Isobu stitching it back up.</p><p>“What does Shimura want with me?!” She tries.</p><p>One of them charges at her. She flips them onto their back and knocks them out with a hit to the jaw before they can recover.</p><p>She leaves each one unconscious on the forest floor. It’s not easy, but they were fighting to capture. She could tell. Isobu patches her up as quickly as he can, which really is the advantage she needed.</p><p>The last one, she unarms and pulls to her. As fire coral grows to lock their wrists and feet together -- the sting is sure to make them regret not wearing gloves -- she pulls them up to speak to them.</p><p>“What does Shimura want with me?” She repeated. “Why did you attack?”</p><p>There’s no answer. The shinobi just sits, loose in her hands, silent. She knocks them out, too, when it's clear that she won't get a response.</p><p>What is she supposed to do? Kakashi warned her not to come back, and she trusts him more than she trusts the Village as a whole. It's the kind of thought that'd get her in a lot of trouble, or at least suspicion, but it's true. Hopefully knocking out a bunch of Konoha shinobi won't reflect poorly on her.</p><p>Rin steps away. Rin runs.</p><p>She only stops when the sky starts to turn dark. On a wide oak limb, she catches her breath, and wishes that Kakashi had only been paranoid when he warned her about Shimura. the more she learns, the more she’s glad she left.</p><p><i>He wants you caged</i>, Isobu guessed. <i> It seems to me like he wants power, and a jinchuuriki that can work with their bijuu is nothing if not powerful</i>. She remembers Kushina telling her "you're going to be a goddamn force of nature, kid". Nods. <i>If the Hokage allowed you out here, this Shimura can’t directly defy him by having you ordered back, so he’s taking this approach instead.</i></p><p>Rin frowned.</p><p>“I just don’t understand why he’d attack me. Kushina told me what it’s like to be a jinchuuriki, how we become just weapons to be kept close by, but then why did Lord Sandaime let me leave?”</p><p>He had no answer.</p>
<hr/><p>Rin is getting tired.</p><p>There have been more jobs, everywhere from repairing fences to week-long escort details, because she doesn’t know what else to do with herself.</p><p>She was anonymous out here, just a girl on the road. If she covered up the clan seals on her cheeks, she was so blessedly plain looking that no one gave her a second look.</p><p>She loved the freedom, the sense that she was doing good. Out here, it was tangible. Instead of having to carry out missions, she could help a family repair their roof in exchange for dinner and a mat on their floor that night, and she could listen to the rain outside at midnight and know that she helped keep them dry.</p><p>She loved seeing the world, meeting different types of people in different types of landscapes. Once she was able to leave the Land of Fire, she’d see an even broader spectrum, but for now she was content where she was. Rin had always spent so much time studying the people around her. Of course she loved this aspect of travel.</p><p>But despite it all, she was tired. She was afraid, after Kakashi’s warning and Root’s attack. What was going on back home?</p><p>There are nights where she looks up at the moon and wonders if she’s a coward. Nights when she lays awake and thinks “what am I doing?” and doesn’t know how to answer. It’s just that something tells her she can’t turn back now.</p>
<hr/><p>When winter becomes imminent, Isobu goes to sleep. He’ll <i>wake up when spring comes</i>, he tells her, and closes his eyes. A few months must be nothing to him, huh?</p><p>As the nights grow longer, Rin feels her morale dropping. In November not long after her birthday, she comes across a secluded village in the mountains. It looks to be in the dead of winter, up there, while down below it’s only just begun to frost. The inn is cheap there, the village rarely traveled, and relying on other ways to get by than tourists and travelers.</p><p>She gets a nice room, with a fireplace and thick quilts, and the woman in charge tells her they haven’t had a visitor in so long, wouldn’t she eat with the family and exchange stories?</p><p>So she does.</p><p>The days pass slowly and quickly at the same time. She retires for bed early each night and rises late each morning, little work to do but watch children sled or help prepare meals. When she’s not working, she’s in her room, running through her katas to keep them fresh in her memory, or sleeping.</p><p>It’s a beautiful little village. It really is. Warm homes in contrast to the deep snow outside, and even warmer people. No one comments on how long she’s stayed, and no one knew her long enough to notice that she wasn’t quite herself.</p>
<hr/><p>She wakes up one day with a migraine and sore throat, and just goes back to bed.</p><p>In the past, she had always taken care of herself when she was sick, because she was a medic. She had never just so entirely neglected her responsibilities to herself or others like this.</p><p>When she wakes up next, she doesn’t know how long she’s been asleep. She feels too warm, aching and sweaty all over. There’s a fire in her hearth, and a glass of water beside her. A child has dozed off in the chair beside her bed. As her eyes adjust to the waking world, she recognizes the innkeeper’s son, eight years old, with an optimistic determination that still reminds her painfully of Obito.</p><p>He wakes when she sits up.</p><p>“You’re okay! Mom said you’d get better if we let you rest, that it was just a cold like I get every winter, but you slept for days, and Mom had to make you drink broth and I was afraid you’d be asleep forever!”</p><p>She stares at him. Her mind catches up slowly, working through his babbling, and she blinks even slower.</p><p>“Thank you for taking care of me,” she murmurs finally. He beams at her.</p><p>After that, she gets better at eating with his family every night. Apparently, she really had worried them, when they realized how much she’d withdrawn into herself, and even more when they didn’t see her for three days straight.</p><p>It feels awful to realize she’d made them worry over her, but the innkeeper simply smiles kindly at her and says she’s glad to see Rin feeling better.</p><p>She leaves once the world below starts to bloom. Though the family assures her otherwise, she’d stayed far too long. Someday, she’ll visit, she tells them.</p><p>There were promises she had to keep, and many roads still left for her to walk. Miles to go, and all that.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>Coming next: Rin learns some things, meets some familiar (and unfamiliar) faces, and maybe a look at what Obito and Kakashi are up to?</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0002"><h2>2. i know things will get better</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>None of them are really sure what they're actually doing with their lives.</p>
          </blockquote><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>as of 10/18/2020, “caught by the dogs (interlude: Obito)” was added to “two steps on the water”, a missing scene I hadn’t thought of when I originally posted the piece. Along with that, is one short scene in that same plotline, in the first chapter... more on that in the notes of two steps on the water... hate to add to something I'd considered finished but they needed to be there imo</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>The second year of Rin’s life outside the Village walls, she spends seeing the effects of war.</p><p>The Land of Fire is struggling, for all that the daimyo and Hokage try to hide it. The worst of it, Rin thinks, is with the civilians. She passes through village after village wrecked because they couldn’t get protection in time --or couldn’t pay-- and people, sick and starving.</p><p>So she continues to help where she can, even if it’s not enough. More than anything she wishes she could still heal, because so many of these villages hold the sick and the injured, particularly the many that are plagued by bandits. There’s nothing she can do except offer some help. </p><p>A year passes. Rin waits and waits and waits for Root to attack her again. They don’t. She doesn’t know why. </p><p>She’s granted permission to leave the Land of Fire, though with that comes its own dangers. She tucks away her hitai-ate, which she’d worn less and less anyways, but she’s still going to be marked as foreign in most areas she goes.</p><p>Well, Rin decides, she’ll deal with that when she has to.</p><p>And she doesn’t really have to. </p><p>There are minor conflicts, a few fights to win, one time when she’s held up at a city gate. Otherwise, she doesn’t face much trouble as she starts to travel further.</p><p>In the Land of Rivers, she watches parades and buys maple candies at a festival. She doesn’t stay long, because it’s honestly not that different from Konoha’s climate, and she wants to see more. </p><p>The Land of Wind is a very different climate. Though Isobu finds that the desert is very much not to his liking and asks her to leave, and while the sun was indeed harsh until she bought the right clothing, she liked it. Maybe because it was so new to her. </p><p>She spends a month in Suna. The buildings were so tall! It was a little intimidating at first, to be surrounded by stone giants in that way. Konoha tended towards rounded rooftops and complexes no taller than six stories, but it seemed like Suna was all towering rectangles. </p><p>The Kazekage’s home had nine floors. She wondered what he did with it all. </p><p>There’s a lot of new things to try. She discovers figs, and decides that she doesn’t like them as much as strawberries, but that she does still like them very much. They dry well, too, so she buys some for the road, when she leaves.</p><p>Other Villages are not so welcoming. She steers clear of most, except one lucky trip into Yugakure, which has recently chosen pacifism. The hot springs there were wonderful. Overall, she tends to pay more attention to the smaller towns and villages, the ones that need her more.</p><p>At Isobu’s request, she does take her time. She tries, at least. She’s still not really used to it.</p><p>The Land of Earth alone takes her months to traverse, the coarse rock and towering mountains so unfamiliar to her that it was easy to find detours. After that, she heads down south, then back up, and eventually to the east again.</p><p>She still takes jobs where she can find them, and helps where help is needed. For all that she was never the type to stand out, people notice her, now.</p>
<hr/><p>Few shinobi knew destruction like medics. </p><p>It seems antithetical, doesn’t it? But to mend something, you have to first understand how it is broken.</p><p>Rin was nine when she lost her first patient. A child in the eyes of the civilian doctors, a young apprentice in the eyes of the med-nin, and a capable medic in her own right. There was no room for coddling in war, and so she was not treated differently by her mentor.</p><p>The man had been brought back from the battlefield missing a leg, half his face, and most of his fingers. She’d gotten to work as soon as he was set in front of her, and she had known he was dying.</p><p>That hadn’t made it any easier. </p><p>When his heartbeat disappeared and his lungs stopped working, she buried her face in blood-soaked hands and cried. </p><p>It had been a civilian doctor who found her and comforted her. Washed her hands and gently but firmly told her that there was nothing she could have done. She knew that. But it still hurt. </p><p>She never did like killing, even long, long after her career desensitized her to the sight of death. Rin learned quickly that people could be very, very cruel.</p>
<hr/><p>She kicked a pebble, watched it skip forward on the path. </p><p>Still no hint of where Obito had gone. What was she even doing here?</p>
<hr/><p>Kakashi wished this mission hadn’t reminded him so much of Rin. </p><p>He was… he was glad that no one had died, that the girl who had called Kinoe her brother, “Tenzo”, could be free now, though he also resented that even her decision to see the world reminded him of Rin, too. It seemed like the resolution of it all had really meant something to Kinoe, and he hoped it helped them. He might not know the kid very well, but… With what Kakashi knew about their past, the kid deserved something good.</p><p>See, this is where Gai would interrupt and tell him Kakashi was only thinking this because he himself didn’t have any sort of closure or anything. Maybe he was right. That’s not important.</p><p>It had been a couple years since he’d last seen Rin, but shinobi had their ways of getting information, and so, most word of a girl fitting Rin’s description came back to him one way or another. </p><p>He didn’t care much about most details, he really didn’t, but he needed the reminder that she was okay, out there. That she was alive, and making the most of her life.</p><p>There was nothing about Obito. He couldn’t even guess where their teammate had gone, what he was doing, if he was even still alive… he wasn’t sure what he wanted the answers to be, either.</p><p>Sometimes, he was afraid that he’d find out where Obito had gone in the form of a mission to kill him. </p><p>There was no real basis to this fear, but wasn’t that the thing with fears, anyways? That they aren’t rational? … He had only half been listening when Kurenai was talking about it the other day. Too busy thinking about how Orochimaru had as good as toyed with him, back on that mission with Kinoe and the wind girl.</p><p>Kakashi was raised for Konoha. So, in Konoha he stays. If Rin or Obito ever come back, he tells himself he’ll be a better teammate for them.</p><p>His house is so empty without them breaking in every other day. Gai notices it, too. Speaks more, gestures more widely, like he can fill up the space on his own. Of course, he can’t. But Kakashi appreciates that he tries, that he’s still here.</p><p>It’s awfully lonely to cook for one.</p>
<hr/><p>Rin truly does love traveling like this, though. She thinks about it, sometimes, how much more she likes traveling than staying in one place, doing whatever she was ordered to. It’s so easy to dwell on the crueler parts of the world, but there’s so much beauty out here. </p><p>She wishes she could save moments forever in her mind. Little images of simple happiness. </p><p>The way the leaves sparkle when the sun comes out, after a period of rain. </p><p>A child’s grin, revealing dimples on freckled cheeks. </p><p>The feeling of wind in your hair and warm light on your cheeks, standing surrounded by just grass and sky and clouds and peace, travelers songs on well-worn paths, laughter and fireworks and the sound of waves lapping at the shore. </p><p>This is what it’s made of.</p>
<hr/><p>Obito’s toying with the idea of never leaving his bed. </p><p>Already, Konan and Yahiko had both stopped by to try and get him out. </p><p>Yahiko had popped in, gently concerned, and left quickly when Obito dismissed his worries. He’d calmed down lately, as if trying to balance out the way his two best friends had done the opposite. </p><p>Konan had threatened to pull him out herself if she didn’t see him up and about soon. She was all business today, which meant she had a mission that took her out of the Village. Those always made her more prickly.</p><p>It had been a few hours since she’d left his room. She’d probably meant to come drag him out of bed like she’d threatened, but had to leave for her mission, or something. He’d fallen asleep twice, since, but both times had been short and uneasy.</p><p>The third guest did not knock.</p><p>There was a kunai in Obito’s hand before he could even register anything other than a person moving in his room, but the second he realized who it was, he dropped it. It was too loud when it hit the ground.</p><p>“Get up,” Nagato sighed.</p><p>“No.”</p><p>“Medic’s orders.”</p><p>“You aren’t even a certified medic.”</p><p>“Where would I get a certification?” Nagato rolled his eyes -- he’d grown much more of a spine ever since Hanzo had tried, and failed, to kill off the Akatsuki months ago. He took his job as Yahiko’s left hand (Konan was the right) very seriously.</p><p>Obito turned over, and pulled the blanket over his chin. “I don’t want to talk.”</p><p>“Tough luck, kid.”</p><p>“Not a kid.”</p><p>“Still younger than us,” Nagato was staring at him. “Is this about that new recruit hitting on you. Konan told him to back off, and he said he would.”</p><p>It was Obito’s turn to roll his eyes.</p><p>“Why would a cute guy hitting on me upset me? No, it’s not that. Leave me to wallow by myself.”</p><p>“Well, if you’re admitting you’re wallowing, I definitely can’t leave now.” Nagato sat down at the foot of the bed instead, and leaned slowly back until they were both laying there.</p><p>Ugh. “Ugh,” Obito said emphatically. “I’m just tired.”</p><p>There was silence. If he wanted to be, Nagato could be very patient. It was just a matter of waiting for Obito to say what he was thinking on his own. </p><p>“It’s just that this is Kakashi’s dad’s birthday. He, uh, he killed himself when we were little kids. Me and…” Two years, and he still tried not to think about Rin. Tried to think about a world without things like Root, instead, and usually failed. “We always hung around Kakashi’s, today, got him roped into, like, normal kid stuff, and eating meals together, and shit, so he wasn’t alone.”</p><p>Last year, he’d been too busy to realize the date. He stared up at the ceiling.</p><p>“I don’t know, man.”</p><p>Nagato hummed in response.</p><p>“Come on.” He stood. “It’s Yahiko’s turn to make dinner tonight, but I’m sure he wouldn’t mind if we got some ingredients prepped for him.”</p><p>‘Wouldn’t mind’, he says, like Yahiko won’t be overjoyed. Obito lets Nagato grab him by the wrist, pull him out of bed, push him into the bathroom to wash his face and comb his hair.</p><p>If he’s a little teary later, well, he can blame onions.</p>
<hr/><p>There’s a small town on the edge of the Land of Lightning.</p><p>It was a logging town, once. Not anymore. The lumber mill ate resources up, until miles of spruce and fir and pine had disappeared, and the town still hadn’t made enough money to profit off of what the mill used up. Then the war came along, and that was it.</p><p>The people had become pretty self-sufficient, at this point. Not many exports, even less imports. They made what they needed, and that’s how they got by.</p><p>Rin didn’t stay there long. </p><p>There wasn’t much she could do there, really. Not many injured, not too many scars left by the war except economic circumstances she couldn’t change. </p><p>The town seemed so lost. Everyone had relied so heavily on the mill that, without it, they didn’t know what to do. They worked hard, but only because it was necessary to survive. There was no room for anything else.</p>
<hr/><p>Maybe she should stay somewhere for a while, like she had with that town in the mountains. Get acquainted with some of the scrolls she’d brought from home, maybe catch up on some lost training, make some more money…</p>
<hr/><p>The next village she finds doesn’t want her help. The people eye her, suspicious, as she walks through.</p><p>“We don’t want outsiders,” one older man spits. “You shinobi type have done enough to us, haven’t you?”</p><p>She doesn’t stay the night.</p>
<hr/><p>People made up all sorts of rumours about Team Minato. They’d been on track to be legends, after all, had been so in the public eye of Konoha it was impossible not to hear things. The Yondaime, Sakumo Hatake’s prodigal son, the Sanbi jinchuuriki, and the late-bloomer Uchiha who could avoid any attack.</p><p>Rin and Obito got their claims to fame, eventually. If they hadn’t left, the three of them could’ve been the next Sannin, some said. Maybe they still are, in a way. Maybe if Kakashi left they’d continue the pattern.</p><p>The one who left, the one who followed, caught up in their orbit, unable not to chase after, and the one left behind.</p>
<hr/><p>“Hello,” Rin tucked a stray bit of hair behind her ear, and clasped her hands in front of her, “I was wondering if there was any work here?” </p><p>She held back a wince at the way her voice turned up at the end, making it a question. She was 17, not a child!</p><p>It was snowy outside with the last legs of winter, but so lively you hardly felt it. To Rin, winter was always desolate -- the trees were bare, and it seemed as though the entire world was washed of all color. </p><p>Here, there were bright lanterns and tiled walls, fences covered in graffiti, which would never be kept up in Konoha. This store here was cozy, clearly some sort of general store, the kind of place lots of people came in and out of. It’s why she’d figured if there was anything she could help with here, this was a good place to look.</p><p>The elderly woman behind the counter studied her, expression inscrutable. </p><p>“Work.” </p><p>“Yes! Um, any need for defense from bandits or the like, or any repairs that an extra set of hands could help with? I may not look it, but I’m strong!”</p><p>“I’m sure you are,” The older woman said. Her voice was dry, but Rin couldn’t tell if that was because she didn’t believe her, or if she just talked like that.</p><p>“As it happens,” the woman continues, “I’ve been needing a hand around the shop. Got boxes to lift, things like that which my back wouldn’t enjoy me doing myself. Think that would work for you?” </p><p>Rin nods vigorously. The woman frowns a little at her, and she tries to tone down her enthusiasm. </p><p>“Thank you!” A pause. “Would you happen to know any place where I could stay?</p><p>The old woman sighs.</p>
<hr/><p>Obito just can’t get used to the weather, in Ame. </p><p>It wasn’t unexpected, obviously. Like, he’d spent months here before, and, well. The Village is named Ame for a reason. But Konoha was only ever really rainy in autumn, maybe a little in the spring, too. But that was it.</p><p>October was always the wettest month. His mind drifts, against his will, to October 10th and he scowls. Turns his thoughts to his work, instead.</p><p>The Akatsuki is doing good things. He believes this, he really does. In hindsight, he can compare this to the work he did for Konoha, serving a Hokage who serves a daimyo, who serves greed and disguised violence, and he prefers this.</p><p>At least their killing isn’t hidden by bureaucracy and funneled directly into the pockets of the already-wealthy.</p><p>Being here radicalized him a bit, he figures, and he doesn’t think it’s a bad thing.</p><p>Hanzo’s men die easily. It’s almost funny. Hanzo himself is a legend in his power, something that even Obito in all his stubborn confidence would be afraid to face, but his troops clearly do not match up to their leader.</p><p>That’s why they’re the followers, probably. He wonders why they fight for them. Why did any of them, really? Rin and Kakashi, they…</p><p>Maybe soup for dinner tonight. Himiko, the old widow who has them deliver her groceries every week, had given him a jar of beef broth along with her usual, generous tip just earlier today. Said she had meant to make something with it, but had never gotten around to it. She didn’t want the broth to go to waste.</p><p>He didn’t point out to her that he knew she’d only made it two weeks ago, and that he knew it would have lasted several months frozen. Obito reminded her of her late grandson, caught in the destruction that the Sannin and Hanzo’s battles had brought to Ame. </p><p>Well, if nothing else, Obito was used to helping old ladies, and their grandmotherly ways. It was familiar, and that familiarity was almost comforting.</p><p>No matter how much he reminded himself he was trying for something of a fresh start, he could never quite forget the past. He’d tried, though. Hadn’t stuck.</p><p>Maybe the soup would have to wait. He wipes his kunai off on his victim’s shirt, slips the blade into his own thigh holster, readjusts his coat hood. They’d gotten some new recruits last night, coming in from some struggling village a day away. Not enough broth for everyone, and he didn’t want to cook two meals.</p><p>The rain was so loud.</p>
<hr/><p>Rin was going to stay here a while. Isobu didn’t argue. </p><p>This was as good a place as any to regather herself, figure out how to get Team Minato back together again. She couldn’t wander aimlessly, hoping to stumble across useful information, forever.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>I'm trying to keep to roughly a monthly update schedule! First semester at college is... killing me, so I appreciate the patience even though my chapters aren't very long ^^<br/>next: Some time with summons.</p>
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<a name="section0003"><h2>3. update</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>hi</p>
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    <p>I haven't abandoned this. (I was telling the truth when I said I have no plans of abandoning this! This AU's been in my head 2 years already its just a matter of getting it actually written and having to work around my focus going to series that aren't Naruto bc I have no control over this brain of mine). I HAVE been working on the third chapter at a snails pace because of end-of-semester schoolwork AND I... do not think I want to use Ao3 after learning more about how much it, um &lt;3, sucks. I'm talking about the "allowing porn of real life children" here btw. So I'm figuring smth out we'll see.</p>
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